Monday, February 21, 2005

I am overwhelmingly excited, as I am not due any visitors today. I adjust my hair and throw open the door.

It is Short Tony.

"You are meant to be at work," I tell him crossly. "I thought I had a mystery visitor."

He replies that he has some unexpected spare time, and challenges me to a game of tennis.

I tell him that I've just finished a big lunch, and so I will not be able to run around much. But he dismisses my protest with a laugh. "I know," he says. "I've got a webcam hidden in your kitchen. Come on!"

I am never one to turn down a challenge, except really difficult ones. So I don my Matalan and follow him out. All the time, however, I am alarmed that he has a webcam hidden in my kitchen.

This seems to go beyond good neighbourliness. I hope he does not have a video from Monday of me having sex with my dinner. Even though I didn't, he could have falsified the evidence by going on an advanced Adobe Premier/After Effects IT course at Fakenham College then piecing a video together frame by frame in order to post it on the Internet to embarrass me. And I would be unable to deny it because it would be so realistic right down to the sound effects when I withdraw, even though it was all a fake and wasn't true.

That is the sort of man he is.

The thought of his probable betrayal makes me angry, and I administer a good thrashing in the tie breaker, despite the leaden effects of two large slices of toast, a jar of potted shrimp and some home-made pate (lamb's liver).